Wednesday, December 9, 2015

The Language of ISIS

The indictment of an Akron Ohio man gives us some idea of the language ISIS uses to motivate its charges to kill:  "O Brothers in America, know that the jihad against the crusaders is not limited to the lands of the Khilafah, it is a world-wide jihad and their war is not just a war against the Islamic State, it is a war against Islam…Know that it is wajib (translated to “necessary”) for you to kill these kuffar! and now we have made it easy for you by giving you addresses, all you need to do is take the final step, so what are you waiting for? Kill them in their own lands, behead them in their own homes, stab them to death as they walk their streets thinking that they are safe…”

It seems like this kind of language, extracted from Tumblr, is exactly what is wrong with social media.  This is incitement to murder.  It included addresses of military personnel.  No social media outlet allows this kind of material to be posted on line, but our social media are having difficulties keeping up with changing accounts and the volume of material.  Maybe they aren't trying hard enough.  

We have technology companies who can allow millions of people to communicate in hundreds of different languages, in almost every country in the world, but they don't have search engines to help them find this kind of material inside their own networks.  If they can't police their own content, they will eventually get help doing it.  This is not a free speech issue, and it will haunt them until they do something about it.  


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